Leta McCune

Leta M. McCune, 102 Kearney Resident Leta M. McCune, 102 of Kearney and formerly of Hastings died Monday, June 10, 2013 at Mt. Carmel Nursing Home in Kearney. Services will be 2:30 PM, Tuesday, June 18, 2013 at First Presbyterian Church in Kearney. The Rev. Dr. Stephen Price-Gibson will officiate. Priveate family interment will be held prior to service at Parkview Cemetery in Hastings. Memorials are suggested to the church or to Mt. Camel Nursing Home in Kearney. On-line condolences may be submitted to osrfh.com. O'Brien Straatmann Redinger Funeral Home of Kearney is in charge of arrangements. Leta was born August 25, 1910, to Garfield and Bertha Starr Ritchie on her grandfather Hiram Hickok Starr’s homestead near Glenvil, Clay County, Nebraska. She was baptized and confirmed at the Baptist Church in Glenvil. On January 1, 1934, she married Lawrence James McCune in Smith Center, Kansas. He preceded her in death on January 17, 1994. Leta was a spunky child ??" elated when she beat her older brother at checkers and disgusted enough with her doctor-when he stuck his finger down her throat after she swallowed the pretty pink medicine she found on a high shelf -that she bit him. Education was important to her parents, who met at Grand Island (Nebraska) College. Leta and all of siblings were college educated and when her daughters were born, she purchased a bank for them to save their pennies for college. Leta attended school in Glenvil, walking two and one-half miles from her home through dusty fields with her brother, graduating from Glenvil High School as valedictorian in 1927. She was graduated from Grand Island College in 1931 with a degree in biology. Her first two teaching positions in Clay County were in rural, one-room schools, where she stoked the fire and swept the floors. After her daughters were in school, she was called to teach half-day kindergarten. This required additional college work to prepare her for an elementary certificate. She retired in 1972 after teaching 20 years in Lincoln School in Hastings. Leta and her family enjoyed traveling. They took a summer vacation every year, traveling to the West Coast, East Coast, Puerto Rico, Canada, Colorado, and to South Carolina. Following her husband’s death she traveled with her daughters to England, Scotland, Alaska, and with friends to Mexico, the East Coast, Colorado and to Elder Hostels. Leta was a 61-year member of Hastings Readers Guild. When the group disbanded in 1997, the members donated their $12.00 treasury to the Hastings Goodfellows. She was a member of Delta Kappa Gamma. Leta was the PTA president for Morton School (Hastings), on the YWCA board, a church circle member for over 60 years. She directed Bible School, taught Sunday School, and sponsored the Baptist Youth Fellowship. In Hastings she volunteered for Meals on Wheels and for the Mary Lanning Memorial Hospital. In Kearney she volunteered at the Senior Center, Good Samaritan Hospital, Red Cross Bloodmobile, and at Emerson School, where the children read to her. She was a P.E.O. member in both communities (Chapter AS in Kearney). Survivors include her daughters, Mary Jo McCune Morrow and husband, Gordon, of Kearney and Janet McCune Linden of Seattle, Washington; grandchildren J. Ritchie and Amber A. Morrow and their son James of Omaha; Robert G. and Patricia A. and their children, Jacob, Justin, and Jessica of Omaha; Kathy L. Morrow of Kearney, and Mark and Alison Linden and their sons, Aaron and Eli of Langley, British Columbia, Canada, and Seattle. In addition to her husband she was preceded in death by her parents, brother Lawrence Starr Ritchie, and sisters, Verena Ritchie, Laura Ritchie Schlachter, and Vera Ritchie Moorhead.

Leta McCune

August 25, 1910 - June 10, 2013